The church is not God’s gift to the world. Christ is God’s gift to the world. The church is a part of God’s plan. The church is the repository of those who are saved by Christ. The church is a demonstration of God’s power and wisdom in uniting diverse people. The church willingly accepts the …
Category Archives: Church
An Identity Statement
Each church must answer three questions: Why? What? How? WHY? Why do we exist? Why are we here? What is our purpose of mission? A good mission or purpose statement fills in the blank: “We exist to….” WHAT? What should we look like? What is our identity? What makes us different? What would we look …
Analyzing our “Baggage”
Any time one comes to a study or discussion of the Bible, one brings “baggage.” No one begins with a perfectly clean slate. We must be honest about our preconceptions, traditions, pre-understandings. This article suggests five possible pieces of baggage–reactionism, separatism, legalism, misunderstanding how the Bible communicates, and of more recent vintage, increasing indifference to …
Restoring What?
“In every church, in every institution, there is something which sooner or later works against the very purpose for which it came into existence.” (C. S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, 94). If Lewis is right, we would do well to ask ourselves afresh why the church came into existence, how the current …
Churches of Christ: Has our ‘culture’ changed?
In the question raised in the title, the culture of a church refers to purpose, thinking, values, worldview, content and method of communication. Some have called this the DNA of the church. Few observers would deny that the contemporary church has less focus on and fewer expectations regarding evangelism. There is less focus on bringing …
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What We Are Doing Isn’t Working!
I reject pragmatism! I do not want to make decisions (especially decisions about church, ministry, and missions) based exclusively on “what works”. Yes, I admit that sometimes doing what God wants does not yield immediate results. I also admit that doing what God wants may not yield results at all. Church history reminds us that …
Missional Evangelism
Contemporary surveys suggest that between two-thirds and three-fourths of those we encounter daily are essentially unchurched, connected only casually or nominally with a church or faith community. This does not mean that they are not spiritual, or even religious, but only that they are not practicing that faith in the context of a Christian religious group. …
A New Reformation: Where are we going?
Throughout the history of the Christian church, Christianity has been constantly shaped and reshaped with various groups and sub-groups. Fairly early in Christian history, Catholicism divided into eastern and western groups—Orthodox and Roman (Eastern and Western). In the Reformation, (Roman) Catholicism was opposed by Christian reformers. The nationalism of the European Reformation was one motivation …
Finding Your PLACE
Where do you “fit” in the church? Every Christian has a place, but every place isn’t for every Christian (1 Cor. 12:12ff; Eph. 4:11-16) Here are five steps to help you toward finding your place. 1. Personal Discovery Who are you? Think and pray about the things that make you you. Think and pray about …
Boxed in by Tradition: Can We Escape?
We are planting and sustaining traditional churches, even when we use untraditional means at the beginning of a church plant. In many church plantings, we are using biblical methods, e.g. small groups, house churches, simple churches, neighborhood networks, etc., but as soon as we have a viable base, we are establishing traditional churches. In using …